


i speak in smoke signals and you answer in code

by possessedradios (orphan_account)



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: (both just very briefly), Gen, It might not look like it but don't let yourself be fooled: This is nothing but a disguised Vent Fic, Minor Attempts At Coping, Platonic Cuddling, dissociation mention, murder mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-30 10:30:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14494989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/possessedradios
Summary: She doesn't want him to be sad, of course, but some small, horrible part of Alana would miss Jacobi's breaking into her apartment to dissociate in her shower cabinet.





	i speak in smoke signals and you answer in code

Alana would be worried if she wasn’t so awkward; if worry was in her repertoire of easily accessible emotions, together with spite and anger and a very specific, helpless-passive-sad kind of jealousy. But it’s not, and so she perceives the situation as theoretically worrisome but just ends up being slightly annoyed.

“Jacobi,” she says, after knocking at the bathroom door, loud enough, she hopes, to drown out the sound of the running water. 

No reaction.

“Daniel,” she tries. “Daniel, you’ve been in there since I got home!” Which means: fifty minutes, the least. That’s an awful lot of water she’ll have to pay for, and sure she has the money, but it’s a matter of principle, right, and anyway, that’s not even touching the whole ‘We’ve discussed this, please don’t break into my apartment’ aspect of the whole thing. If he hadn’t left his shoes by the door, and if she didn’t know his footwear so well, she might have thought there was someone else in here, a burglar that suddenly felt like taking a fifty-minute-shower for example, although fifty minutes would, of course, have been enough time for her to call the police and for them to arrive, not that she’d ever call the police; she has a gun–

But that’s not the point, because Jacobi _did_ leave his shoes by the door, and the likelihood of a burglar taking a fifty-minute-shower in her apartment isn’t very big to begin with, she supposes.

“I’m coming in,” she announces, and again: more annoyance than worry, and the fact that she really has to pee.

The bathroom is filled with steam, her skin is immediately covered in a small layer of tiny droplets as she steps in, a certain kind of sticky dampness, like her glasses when she leans over a fresh cup of tea.

Alana doesn’t like it.

“Daniel,” she sighs, leaning against the shower cabinet. “Will you come out any time soon? I have to pee.”

“Suit yourself,” comes the answer after a few seconds, and she rolls her eyes. “I won’t look.”

“Come on,” she says. “If you don’t come out, I’ll _drag_ you out.”

He groans, but that’s how she knows that she’s won. “I’ll wait outside, then I’ll pee, and then we can talk,” she says, and is pretty sure he mumbles something along the lines of ‘who said I wanted to talk’ in return. She turns around and waits outside, and when Jacobi opens the door, shivering and only wearing his boxers and wrapped in her oversized bathrobe she stole from a hotel room in Kingston or Toronto or Nancy, who the fuck knows, who cares, she pulls him out and goes in and pees, and by the time she’s done, he’s sitting in her living room.

“I fucked up,” he says, which, of course he did, because why else would he break into her apartment and take a fifty-minute-shower. That’s something people who fucked up do, clearly. Alana nods.

“Kepler or Klein?” she asks, because that’s the million dollar question right now, and he makes a _sound_ and a vague gesture with his left hand.

“God, I wish I’d have the kinds of problems I’m dealing with with Kepler. At least I’d be sleeping with him, then,” he says.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” she says.

He nods.

Two hours later, they are somehow back in her bathroom, and they’re lying on the floor, because Jacobi thinks that’s, quote, neat. 

“I suck, we both suck,” he says, and Alana isn’t sure what he means, because she’s not the one who’s in love with with her CO and messed up her relationship with a perfectly nice guy.

“You broke into my apartment and sat on the floor in my shower cabinet for an hour,” Alana says. “You’re the one who sucks.”

“Well where the fuck else am I supposed to dissociate?” he asks and sounds, somehow, genuinely curious.

She sighs and shakes her head, rubbing her eyes before blinking up at the bathroom light again; a bare lightbulb hanging half into the room. She should probably do something about that. Next week, she thinks, and then: Or next month. 

“You think Klein will take me back if I ask nicely?” Jacobi asks.

“Not if he’s smart,” Alana says, because she’s too tired to be considerate and because she knows she doesn’t have to force it with Jacobi. He snorts.

“Shit,” he grins. “I’m _aaall_ alone.”

That’s a funny thing to say, Alana thinks, while he’s lying on the floor of her bathroom, but she knows what he means, so she doesn’t object.

They’re both quiet for a while, and Jacobi’s breathing evens out almost enough for her to think he might have fallen asleep like that, he’s always been great at falling asleep in the most uncomfortable places; under her desk, on the backseat of a car, in Kepler’s presence–

But when she turns her head to look at him, his eyes are open, and he’s staring straight up into the bare lightbulb, hanging half into the room. Every hint of amusement is gone from his face, and it takes him almost another ten minutes until he speaks again – Alana counts the seconds because she doesn’t know what else to do – but when he does, his voice is completely serious and a little desperate.

Is that it? She’s just not good at this. She knows Jacobi so intimately, she might know him better than even herself, but when it comes to intonation and subtext, certain changes are so subtle that she really can’t tell, not even with him. She thinks it’s desperation, but perhaps it’s something simpler, perhaps it’s just sadness, or it’s way more complicated, something to do with Kepler and Klein and the fact that he wants what he can’t have and doesn’t want what he has or– She doesn’t know. 

Anyway. He asks: “Hey … ‘lana? D’you think… D’you think we deserve love?”

Alana suddenly feels a little uncomfortable and almost starts to cry because she never feels uncomfortable in Jacobi’s presence, she doesn’t want him to do or say or ask something that makes this fundamental aspect of their relationship make a shift, she doesn’t want this to change.

“I…” she starts and then promptly trails off, unsure about what to say, how to proceed. 

“Freud said,” Jacobi starts, and then cuts himself off as well, most likely because he suddenly remembered that they hate Him-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

“Doesn’t everyone deserve love?” Alana asks in the end, because the whole thing was important enough for Jacobi to ask even though he’s sad and they don’t usually talk about things so profound when either of them is sad.

There’s nothing for a long while, and Jacobi lifts one hand and rubs at his face before he murmurs, “I don’t know. I don’t know, ‘lana. I mean, name a single thing anyone could ever love about us.”

She almost startles because he says ‘us’, not ‘me’, and because her immediate reaction is to laugh because it really does seem absurd; sure she told him that he’s the one who sucks, but neither of them is good enough at suppression and bad enough at self-reflection to pretend they’re nice people. 

(Neither of them would even consider pretending they’re people, really.)

Alana doesn’t want to lie to him, and she doesn’t come up with a single thing even after thinking about it for a few minutes, because any trait she _could_ name would always be preceded by _I love–_ , and that’s the thing: They love each other, they love a variety of things about each other, and for her, this might be enough, but it isn’t for Jacobi. (And: She doubts someone else would love the way his hands are shaking after he’s killed someone, that’s a fucked up thing to love, so she can’t name that, anyway.) ((And: Some small, horrible part of her doesn’t want anyone else to love him; some small, horrible part would miss his breaking into her apartment to dissociate in her shower cabinet; some small, horrible, indescribably inhuman part of her is jealous even in theory.))

So, what Alana does is this: She _doesn’t_ lie to him, instead she says nothing, and she thinks that this is probably answer enough for him. However, when he finally drops his hand from his face, she feels for it on the cool tile floor, and she intertwines their fingers, and after a moment, Jacobi gently squeezes her hand.

She manages to convince him to move to the bedroom shortly after, and once they’re lying in bed – Jacobi still wrapped into the bathrobe – she pulls him close and hugs him tightly, and he completely relaxes into the hug, and his hands are cold, but his breathing is still incredibly calm, and he nuzzles his face into the crook of her neck and exhales slowly, and Alana thinks that just for now, for tonight, the fact that _she_ loves him might be enough.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm @possessed-radios on tumblr and @shortwaveattentionspan is my podcast sideblog. The first one to identify what song this fic is ridiculously heavily inspired by without having to google the title will have my undying love.


End file.
